


raison d'être

by Jedi Buttercup (jedibuttercup)



Category: Out of the Dark - David Weber, WEBER David - Works
Genre: Character of Color, Declarations Of Love, M/M, Missing Scene, Vampires, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000, Yuletide 2016
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-20
Updated: 2016-12-20
Packaged: 2018-09-10 13:58:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8919841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jedibuttercup/pseuds/Jedi%20Buttercup
Summary: The man who'd sat at Stephen's bedside when he lay dying, pressing Stephen's hand against his chest and taking all the blame for the failed defense of their people on his own shoulders, was no monster.  And if he had to tell him that every day from here until eternity, he was more than willing to do so.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [oneiriad](https://archiveofourown.org/users/oneiriad/gifts).



> Written as a treat in Yuletide 2016. Because I was one of the people extremely taken off guard by the twist the first time through the book; and your prompt made me want to read it again to see I might like it better if I knew what was coming... :)

The thing Stephen Buchevsky was having the hardest time getting over about his latest abrupt and painful change of circumstance wasn't the sudden lack of a heartbeat. Nor was it the gruesome process of recovering from the wounds that had led to his death, the occasional panic attack that woke him at the realization that he _wasn't breathing_ , or the moral quandaries that were part and parcel of his new existence.

No-- it was the way the leader of the band of Romanian villagers Stephen and the other survivors of his stranded US military convoy had spent the last several months defending still called him "my Stephen". The man he'd come to know as Mircea Basarab-- the fierce and extremely capable warrior who'd inexplicably made a thirty-five year old career Marine feel _safe_ rather than properly wary from the start-- had turned out to be Vlad Drakulya. _The_ Dracula, former Prince of Wallachia, whose existence and bloody history had inspired centuries' worth of horror stories around the world. And yet he still gave Stephen that warm, magnetic smile every time he saw him, and laid possessive hands on him whenever he was within reach.

It boggled the mind. He'd always known there was darkness and pain in Mircea's past, depths to rival and even surpass the black hole that had opened behind Stephen's ribs when the aliens' initial bombardment had killed his wife and children. He hadn't talked about it much, but the incident with the impaled Shongairi bodies had been fairly illustrative, and the pained stillness behind the man's brilliant green eyes had resonated with him too strongly to ignore. But to finally have the full picture, to know that the original Impaler of legend still thought of Stephen as an equal, even a check on his darker impulses....

Well, there was only so long even a good Methodist preacher's son, raised in the South and shaped to manhood by the American military, could hold out against that level of commitment. The kind he would have previously associated with the novels Trish used to keep on her nightstand, to while away the evenings when he was gone and read the choicer bits aloud to embarrass him when he was home.

He would never, ever forget her or their daughters. His marriage might have already been on the rocks when the Shongairi had dropped _literal_ rocks from orbit to wipe Washington DC off the map, but that didn't make Trish's loss any less painful, or in any way lessen his grief for Shania and Yvonne. But the thing was, he also knew Vlad didn't expect that from him; that he carried long-past griefs of his own too close to the heart to forget. And he'd made Stephen feel something other than rage again, despite the intervening months of devastation and grueling war; made him laugh again, something he wouldn't have believed possible when they'd first run into each other stalking a Shongairi patrol.

Vlad might still think of himself as a monster, but Stephen knew better. The man-- vampire, whatever-- who'd sat at Stephen's bedside when he lay dying, pressing Stephen's hand against his chest and taking all the blame for the failed defense of their people on his own shoulders, was no monster. And if Stephen had to tell Vlad that every day from here until eternity, he was more than willing to do so.

And wasn't that a kick in the pants. Stephen didn't know whether the guy thing or the vampire thing would come as a worse blow to his parents, God willing they were still alive to disapprove of his choices. They'd probably adjust eventually, because they loved him; but his dad would also no doubt spend the rest of his days praying for his son's corrupted soul. They would just have to deal, though. Because there was no universe in which Stephen would rather give Mircea, his Dracula up-- or have died 'virtuously' in valiant and ultimately futile defense of the civilians under their protection-- than live to help him _continue_ to protect them for the rest of his newly lengthened existence.

He hadn't realized that his eyes had drifted shut during all that thinking, or that his expression had furrowed until he felt a cool hand drift over his forehead, tracing the lines of his frown. 

"What troubles you, my Stephen?" a familiar, fond voice murmured.

"M'wake; I'm awake," Stephen replied, blinking his eyes open and twitching his mouth into a smile at the face leaning over him. When they were both standing, Stephen was several inches taller than Vlad's five foot ten or so, but he'd had ample opportunity to appreciate the opposite perspective over the last couple of days of adjustment. "Just resting my eyes while I did some thinking."

"Heavy thoughts, I see." The corners around Vlad's green eyes crinkled at that statement. "How is the pain?"

"Better," Stephen replied, nodding faintly under the reassuring touch. Enough that he didn't regret moving from the bed to a chair, at least; his memories of that first awakening after the fight were blurred and distant from the shock of the change, but the dizziness and pervasive fiery throb under his skin had been worse than any injury he'd experienced in the past. It was down to an arthritic all-over ache now, though, as the last of his transformation finally settled. Almost to the end of the three days of lore-- though thankfully he hadn't had to spend any of that time in a coffin.

"You sure you can't teach me that turning-into-mist thing already?" he continued, giving Vlad a pathetic look. 

It seemed perfectly logical to him that it might hurt a little less if there wasn't any of him present in the physical world to feel it-- totally aside from the part where it had looked really cool when Vlad showed off, of course. Stephen was now living proof of what happened when you crossed the streams between science fiction and the supernatural; when did it get to the part where he reaped the benefits? Other than current company, of course.

"You _are_ feeling better," Vlad observed wryly, lifting his hand off Stephen's brow. "Patience, my Stephen. We will go to save our people, and when we do, I will teach you what you need to know. But first you must rebuild your strength."

That meant more blood; Stephen wasn't any fonder of the taste than he'd been as a 'breather', despite the sharper senses that had come with the change, but he had a feeling it was one of those things that was supposed to grow on you, like eggplant or rhubarb pie. Damn, he was going to miss Southern cooking.

That could wait, though. Stephen caught Vlad's hand before he could turn away, reflexes sharpened just as much as his senses responding almost before he'd completed the thought. "Hey. How are the others?"

"Better, also. Though you are the most recovered; it will be a little while yet before they are in a state to visit," Vlad assured him. 

Only three of Stephen's men had survived the attack-- speaking generally; one of them was PO/3 Jasmine Sherman-- to the same degree that his own current state of health could be called 'surviving'. Just the ones who-- like him-- had been as close to death already as made no difference when the aliens had taken what they came for and left. Considering that the only one of them worse injured than Stephen had been Gunny Meyers, though, he was pretty sure his own state of recovery had little do with vampiric constitution and everything to do with the man in front of him.

He tightened his grip briefly on Vlad's hand, swallowing past the tightness in his throat. There was another question he had to ask, before he lost the nerve. "Do you think, if the puppies had never come here... would you ever have...?"

Some of the good humor drained from Vlad's expression at that half-question, fading back behind the wall of reserve that often came over him when the past rose to haunt him. He didn't pretend not to understand, though. "I have known you for a man worth keeping since first we met. But I have wanted to keep many people over the years, and more often than not chose not to take the risk; for when I did, the results were seldom any better than what I'd sought to save them from. I cannot say if I would have made an exception for you; I had spent over a century trying to leave even the possibility of such behind me."

He'd had to ask, but not because he'd had any doubt of the answer-- because he'd wanted to hear the explanation for it. And _that_ had not disappointed. Stephen smiled, and was gratified by the way Vlad's eyes widened to see it. A very old dog _could_ be surprised by new tricks, it seemed.

"I'd be surprised if you had. I'm just glad you took the chance now," he admitted. "You do know that, right?"

Vlad looked down at their joined hands, the visible contrast as distinct and yet complementary as everything else between them, then back to Stephen's face. "Your religious beliefs..." he began slowly, something softening, aching, in his expression. "I had expected you would welcome the opportunity for revenge, if nothing else. But I admit to a more personal motive. If I could have asked...."

"I would've said yes, so you put that out of your mind right now," Stephen scoffed, then waggled his eyebrows at him. "Go back to the compliments. You wanted to keep me, you say?"

Vlad gave him a wry look. "Even knowing only a part of who I am, you reminded me why I sought to forget for so many years; you gave me moments to look forward to in the midst of very difficult circumstances. As you do it again now. I need you, my Stephen; I do not think I could face what must be done next without you."

Stephen took a shaky breath, then pulled against Vlad's grip, bracing the other hand on the arm of the chair. Not to pull Vlad down-- but to pull himself up, because for this next part he wanted to be on his feet. "You won't have to," he said, ignoring the physical discomfort to make sure he got his point across. "You won't _ever_ have to, I swear it."

"Be very sure of what you are saying," Vlad replied quietly, meeting his gaze with eyes gone as turbulent and deep as the ocean. "I am still the monster underneath; a predator worse even than the Shongairi, from a certain point of view. If I should lose control once more...."

He got the feeling Vlad wasn't just talking about a retaliatory strike on the alien base that had kidnapped their people anymore; that he had something bigger in mind, like the story of Wallachia against the Turks expanded to a planetary scale. Or even further; it hadn't escaped Stephen's notice that not needing to breathe anymore eliminated one of the major weaknesses of humans leaving their own gravity well. That would be a pretty big canvas for blood-thirsty instincts trained by war and vengeance to paint themselves across. But it was only a difference of scale, not essentials; it didn't change his answer.

"I'm sure," Stephen said, simply. "You're not the only one who's getting something out of this, you know. The men who survived the crash with me, the civilians we found-- they gave me something to die _for_ after everything else had been taken away from me. But you've given me a reason to _be_ again, Vlad Țepeș."

It _still_ boggled his mind. But that could be a good thing, too.

"My Stephen," Vlad murmured thickly, eyes bright; and then Stephen found himself discovering firsthand what _else_ a man who didn't have to breathe anymore could do.


End file.
